Audio on demand

Indigenous Participation in Australian Economies conference

A conference held at the Museum in association with the School of Archaeology and Anthropology, Australian National University, and including perspectives from anthropology, history and material culture studies. A major theme was how local ‘hybrid economies’ develop through Indigenous and settler interaction, and how new complexes of transactions and relations emerge.

Altman introduces his conceptual framework ‘the hybrid economy’, devised as a means to overcome the binary between market/non-market and to explore alternative ways of understanding and practising ‘development’.

Christopher Lloyd explores and discusses the development, meaning, use, and usefulness of the concepts of ‘conquest’, ‘hybridity’, and ‘production regimes’ in the field of research into the history of settler/Indigenous relations and their consequences.

Daryl Guse discusses archaeological research in north-western Arnhem Land that indicates early Indigenous participation in and trade with the Indonesian trepang maritime industry, and the adaptability of Indigenous coastal communities.

In the first half of the 19th century, at least sixty Aboriginal men from New South Wales were transported as convicts. Kristyn Harman discusses their labours within the convict system, the rationale for putting them to work, and the outcomes.

Alan O’Connor examines Anangu involvement in economic life from early records pre-contact, through the establishment of the mission Ernabella, in 1937, when dingo scalps were traded for flour, tea and sugar, to the enterprises that emerged in the 1970s.

Alison French considers the role of camels and cars in the evolution of Namatjira’s art and the ways they fostered and sustained both the practice of art as well as myths and stereotypes that position artists and the economic values of their art.

Philip Jones explores the relations between Aboriginal people and ‘Afghans’, whose camel trains linked Central Australian outposts with supply centres and markets in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

Museum collections exaggerate the traditional lives of Indigenous Australians. Here, Mike Pickering seeks to expand Indigenous history to include items that, though the product of western industry, were mostly used by Indigenous workers.

Thorley and Greenslade consider Papunya Tula during the 1970s, as Indigenous art became recognised as fine art, and remote markets developed, shaping the art movement. But local markets persisted, and their effect on the movement warrants further study.

Maria Nugent explores the 130-year-long practice of shell-working by Aboriginal women at La Perouse in Sydney’s south, and how the makers have been able to create or find new markets by adapting their products to appeal to new customers.

Judy Lovell describes Keringke Arts Aboriginal Incorporation and the effect of the ‘Emergency Response’ and government reforms; and Ntwerle Aboriginal Incorporation, a new initiative promoting and hosting whitefella leadership training programs.

Exploring intercultural relations in the period of pastoral expansion, John White says that working relationships based on reciprocity enabled Aboriginal people to factor settlers into their seasonal movements and carve out a niche in the settler economy.

Gwenda Baker traces the history of Aboriginal labour on Methodist missions in Arnhem Land, where award wages led to fewer jobs. While resenting the low wages, some Aborigines see their work on the missions as a highlight of enterprise and achievement.

Challenging the idea that equal wages caused mass eviction and unemployment for Aboriginal people, Fiona Skyring looks at other factors such as how government investigations in 1965 and 1966 discouraged station owners from appropriating pension payments.

Hundreds of Aboriginal men were employed as police trackers from 1862. They enjoyed a regular income, but the work was risky and the pay and conditions terrible. Michael Bennett describes the system and makes the case for a compensatory scheme.

For seven decades the Queensland government intercepted Aboriginal people’s wages, child endowment, pensions, inheritances. It controlled their bank accounts, deducted fees, restricted withdrawals. This was wrong. What are the avenues for redress?

Erin Bohensky applies resilience theory to a proposal for an aquaculture farm as a sustainable enterprise on Palm Island, North Queensland, and adds historical analysis and empirical insights from interviews and photographic surveys.

Dennis Foley describes two kinds of Indigenous entrepreneur: ‘opportunists’ who seize a concept and use their networks to embark on a business venture, and those who lack capital, so out of ‘necessity’ must adapt to dominant culture to provide the basics.

In a good-practice study of where the Dreamtime meets the market, Paul Memmott discusses the Myuma Group (of three Aboriginal corporations) in far west Queensland, which successfully manages the interplay between demand for and supply of service.

Deirdre Tedmanson uses Foucault’s notion of ‘governmentality’ to explore impediments to enterprise development in ‘remote’ homelands and communities on the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara lands of South Australia, and ways of overcoming them.

Payments for Environmental Services (PES) are used to simultaneously tackle poverty and environmental degradation. Using data from two field sites, Nanni Concu talks about the potential of PES to promote a natural-resource-based economy in Arnhem Land.

Are the Dreaming and the Market mutually exclusive? In economics as in anthropology, ‘animal spirits’ are understood to influence outcomes. Geoff Buchanan explores the hybrid economy (customary, market and state) in the context of caring for country.

Gretchen Stolte talks about Aboriginal art centres, arguing that a centre should be funded in accordance with its engagement with the community, because the more community-building it does, the less money it can make.

Ian Keen provides a brief, broad view of the discussions over the two-day conference, its themes and its significance, covering hybrid models, empirical studies and the links between research and practice.